A commentary on rabbinic texts and toxicality

June 26, 2006

The Green Zionist Alliance successfully got three resolutions adopted at the World Zionist Congress. Read below or read more.

·The first resolution will make Sustainable Development a stronger objective of Jewish National Fund/Keren Kayemet L’Yisrael (JNF/KKL) projects.

·The second resolution will lead to the creation of environmental impact statements for World Zionist Organization projects. At present there are no policies within WZO institutions that are in compliance with internationally-recognized standards of environmental responsibility.

·The third resolution requires the use of recycled paper in all World Zionist Organization offices. This resolution will lead to the production of office-recycled paper in Israel for the first time in Israel’s history. Upon the third resolution’s passage, the hall of the Congress buzzed with excitement in recognition of what had just taken place.

I've placed the new newswire at the bottom of my sidebar, next to Google's searchlet. Let me know what you think. Are there any comparable newswires for Jewish law, environmentalism and social ethics?!

September 14, 2005

Israel's "Bottle recycling consortium to continue" reports Haaretz. Yesterday an antitrust court decided to allow a specially-authorized monopolistic consortium to continue collecting returned bottle because dismantling the consortium would harm public interests. Read the whole story, which also noted:

"The organization Adam Teva V'Din [Israel Union for Environmental Defense], which joined the judicial proceedings as a respondent, announced yesterday that the court had acknowledged the importance of the Deposit Law and its implementation. However, the organization added that the law needs to be amended to oblige beverage manufacturers and importers to collect bottles actively, and to cover 1.5 liter bottles." Having drafted Israel's bottle bill in 1999, IUED seeks to improve the program (eg automatic deposit machines).

The first bottle bill passed in Oregon in 1971, pioneering one of the most effective methods of material recycling and reuse. As in Israel, U.S. environmentalists have struggled against bottling companies and retailers to expand the scope of the law, e.g. to cover bottled water.

September 12, 2005

Israel's high-speed train line into Jerusalem will be built along a route that is opposed by environmentalists. Opponents include the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI), the Jewish National Fund (JNF) and local activists. Haaretz reports: "environmentalists claim that the most sensitive section is the bridge over the Yitlah Stream, whose construction and the concomitant extraction of dirt from the region will significantly damage the landscape."

Environmentalists apparently feel betrayed by the park authority, which had worked with them to demand changes to the railway construction plan. Haaretz reports:

The environmental groups criticized the Parks Authority's withdrawal from the struggle. "Having led this campaign, it has now changed its mind at the critical moment. We do not understand the reason for this decision," said a group spokesperson. "The decision by the Nature and Parks [Protection] Authority and its director general will cause tremendous damage to nature and the landscape in this area," said Avraham Shaked, the SPNI's regional coordinator for environmental matters in the Judean Hills, "and we will do everything to prevent this damage."

A word of caution. The right-to-know law’s specifics will be left up to Israel’s environmental ministry. The ministry has six months to propose regulations. Israel’s environmental minister, Shalom Simhon, knows how to play political hardball. Will Simhon issue strong regulations to give Israelis an effective right-to-know about toxic materials? Or will the freedom of information rules be saddled by loopholes etc?

Kudos to the Jewish (and Arab and Druze) activists who pioneered the new toxics law, the Citizens For the Environment (CFE) in the Galilee, directed by Liora Aharon. Email CFE your congratulations, send them a donation, and urge them to keep the pressure on the environmental ministry to promulgate a strong right-to-know law.

Kol tuv,

Kaspit

PS Besides writing 3 linked articles above, Zafrir Rinat, the environmental reporter for Ha’aretz, also gives us an update on a lawsuit to clean up the toxic Yarkon River.

UPDATE: The language of Israel's new environmental information law is indeed broad and vague:

Thanks to the Sagit Porat of the Israeli Life & Environment coalition, below is the Hebrew text of the gist of the new law. (Full text here.) It requires the public authority (the environment ministry) to publish on its website (and in other ways as the Minister's will set up). It stipulates that "environmental information [includes] information on released, spilled, emitted and discharged substances and the results of smoke, odor and radiation measurements, not in the private domain." Porat says that "includes" was discussed in committee, omitted from the text, and will (hopefully) be reinserted.

UPDATE: Let me know if you would like your county or zipcode listed here with its environmental data. You can also get more detailed zipcode-specific data through EPA's Envirofacts (use their "Quick Start").

You can find water, air and toxic pollution information on any US zipcode and county, thanks to right-to-know laws. For instance:

August 26, 2005

“[The children of Gaza settlers were] wearing the yellow star with the word jude in Germanic characters emblazoned upon it. Do such tactics trivialize the real Holocaust? Some say so. After all, as tragic as these evictions are, these Jews are being expelled not by Nazis who wish to destroy them, but by fellow Jews who, for the most part, have tried to display gentleness and sympathy.”

The Cross-currents post then endorses and fuels the comparison of Gaza to the Holocaust. The post states: “in the air there lingers a faint Holocaust aroma: forced evacuations; barriers of barbed wire; people forbidden to enter the area; … To be sure, not a Holocaust, but certainly redolent of it.” The post refers to the removal of Gaza settlers as a “velvet-gloved mini-Holocaust.”

In no lexicon are terms like “faint aroma” or “redolent” anything more than suggestions of a distant recollection. Under no circumstances are they to be construed—nor were they intended—as indicating equivalence—especially when I wrote, “to be sure, not a Holocaust…” It is obvious that the horrors of the Holocaust are sui generis, and are not to be placed on the same level with any other such event in history. I certainly did not intend to compare Gaza and the Holocaust, nor do I think I articulated such sentiments (though I did use the term “mini-Holocaust”) but if I gave that impression, I apologize and will try to be more clear in the future.

MY REVISED VIEW: This response deserves to be read in full, especially where he distinguishes between detached analysis and an emotional appreciation for the evicted settlers. In a spirit of "detachment as a counterbalance to our passion," the post below is being edited to focus on a halakhic rebuke of those who compare the Gaza disengagement to the Holocaust, or Israeli forces to Nazis.

The yellow star tactic and other Nazi comparisons do trivialize the Nazi era and the Holocaust. The Holocaust and the array of Nazi persecutions should be characterized in the context of ethnic persecution and genocide. Mass murders in Rwanda, Cambodia, the former Yugoslavia, Armenia, and various aboriginal peoples might be compared to the Holocaust. Many governmental actions are oppressive and immoral, but few can responsibly be labeled a “mini-Holocaust”.

What about the forced evictions? Both Western law and Jewish law give government some discretion with evictions. Even under the “rule of law” [2], of course, evictions may violate human rights -- hence the outcry over the U.S. Supreme Court’s Kelo eminent domain case. While more traumatic than Kelo, the Gaza evacuation likewise offers compensation. Plus, resettlement within the Jewish state. While the Cross-roads post refers only to “a faint Holocaust aroma,” the yellow stars and other rhetoric send an objectionable message.

Those who compare the Gaza evacuation to the Holocaust a "mini-Holocaust", this Cross-currents post insult the IDF and Israeli police. They defame the Israeli government and leaders. It approves the slandering of Israeli Jews as (faintly) comparable to Nazis.

Toxic speech, vitriol, constitutes a severe violation of Jewish law. Slander, defamation, and insult are prohibited through various provisions of halakhah. For instance, wronging by words (honayat devarim) “is worse than a wrong inflicted in financial dealings, because restitution can be made for one and not the other; one is financial, while the other is personal.” (Mishneh Torah, trans Birnbaum) Therefore, comparing the Gaza evacuation to the Holocaust may be a violation of Jewish law on toxic speech.

Should we excuse the Gaza settlers themselves for claiming that they are like victims of the Nazis? Maybe. They feel victimized, desperate. Yet, if we excuse their Holocaust and Nazi rhetoric, wouldn’t we also need to excuse Palestinians comparisons of Zionism to racism and IDF actions to Nazism?

Still,the post at Cross-currents So, comparisons with the Nazi era is are inexcusable. Our rabbinic leaders ought to oppose any comparison of the IDF, Israeli police, or Israel and its leaders to the Nazis. American Rabbis ought not compare the Gaza evacuation to a mini-Holocaust. The post at Cross-currents should be retracted.

The post’s Defamatory language is permissible under secular law in the U.S.and Israel, thanks to freedom of speech. However, the post the yellow star and evocations of the Nazi era violate Jewish law and ethics, which the settlers author surely recognizes as morally and divinely binding.

Kaspit כספית

PS Jewish law offers guidance on proper rebuke of fellow Jews. I would argue that the Nazi comparison also violates the Jewish standards for rebuke of Israel. I hope that my comments here are a proper rebuke. While rebuke is often best done in private, please note that the Cross-currents post itself invites public comment.

PSS What about Missippi Governor Haley Barbour's comparison of hurricane Katrina to Hiroshima? Well, the comparison is somewhat off-kilter, I would say, but it was said in the heat of the moment, not strategically, and I suspect it doesn't offend.

August 21, 2005

There have been conflicting reports about the hazardous materials thrown by some Gaza protesters on IDF soldiers and Israeli police. Were acids thrown? Don’t know. Media reports of acid attacks can raise fears among security personnel and, if wrong, lead to unwarranted reactions and accusations. (See Treppenwitz for an impassioned statement on this point.) Many acids are highly corrosive and can burn skin, disfigure and cause serious harm (e.g., eyes, lungs). In the heat of the moment, it’s not surprising that exposed individuals and medical staff might mistake other material(s) for acids.

Leaving aside acids, I would be concerned about the other hazardous materials reportedly thrown by the Gaza protesters. Paint thinners, cleaning fluids, gasoline, caustic (alkaline) and other solvents, and paint itself, can be harmful even in cases of acute (short-term) exposure. The eyes are very vulnerable. So are the lungs and nasal passages. Dermal exposures can also be problematic. Immediate health effects may vary depending on the individual, because people differ in their biochemistries and pre-existing conditions. In addition, some people develop skin and other chronic conditions (e.g., “chemical sensitivity”) even from acute exposures. Of course, Israeli soldiers and police are in good shape and probably won’t be hurt if merely splattered with paint.

In recent daf yomi reading, the Talmud shows concern about the eyes and the difficulty of health care for the eyes (108b-109a bShabbat). There's also a Talmudic analogue to chemical sensitivity in the case of the istinis (e.g., Rav Yosef, see Bava Batra 22b w/Tosafot).

Jewish law (halakhah) offers viable grounds for civil disobedience on the Gaza withdrawal. However, by throwing hazardous materials at soldiers and police, the Gaza protesters have diluted the halakhic justification for their cause.

Nachamu, nachamu... may our people be comforted,

Kaspit

N.B. Soldiers, protesters, and journalists may also have been harmed by the burning of tires and building materials. To date, I have not read about any complaints about the inhalation of smoke and pollutants.

PS The mainstream media continues to report that acid was thrown in at least one incident. They seem to be relying on IDF sources. The IDF claim about acid has been harshly criticized (I don't vouch for this link).

August 12, 2005

With
events in Israel on my mind, but not wanting to blog on Gaza, here are
a few links related to the environment. First, a link to a toxics blog
that noticed a Haaretz article about how groundwater in Israel is badly polluted. Second, Adam Teva v'Din, one of the most effective Israeli environmental groups, is working on a petition for a clean air bill
which passed a (small) Knesset hurdle on July 20th. Also, COEJL's Kol
Chai listserv took note that the Green Zionist Alliance (GZA) is the
first "environmental Zionist party" to be running a candidate for a
Zionist Congress. Here's the GZA platform. (Strikes me as a reasonable start but not exceptional. Not surprisingly, there is no Orthodox presence.)